Wednesday, February 02, 2011

Love is Murder

I've given up speaking in public, doing interviews, responding to people who want my help in some way, traveling around the country signing books, and several other things I don't enjoy about my career.

I no longer require the approval of others, no longer need to help everyone reach their goals, and no longer want to spend time self-promoting to sell print books in a dying industry. I've always believed advertising is worthless, and these days I see no need for extensive self-promotion.

After all, without doing any of the above-mention things, I made over $40,000 in January. All through self-publishing.

So I've finally reached a point where I can do what I want to do, maximizing my happiness, minimizing discomfort, without having to answer to anyone.

It's glorious.

That said, I'll be making what will likely be my final public appearance for a while, this weekend.Love is Murder is a Chicago-based mystery writing convention taking place this weekend, February 4-6. at the Intercontinental O'Hare.

I'm doing a panel about ebooks, and it'll be the last time you can corner me one-on-one and personally pick my brain.

My panel is 11 to 12 on Saturday, and Saturday night I'm also going to be hosting a gameshow with the headliners, including F. Paul Wilson, Joseph Finder, Rhys Bowen, and other big shots. The game is called Stump the Stars, where I read sections from their books and see if they recognize them. When they don't, I publicly humiliate them. It's a fun time.

So if you're a writer in the Midwest, it's worth digging out of the snow to attend Love is Murder. Lots of good panels, the fine company of your peers, and I'm bringing a few bottles of expensive whiskey and I'm known to throw room parties.

Glad to hear about the money, Joe, and that you get to kick back and do what you want now. I won't say that you've earned it ( I know how you feel about that) but will say that it couldn't have happened to a better guy.

Thanks for all the info and the inspiration over the years. I just got my first novel up on Amazon and Smashwords almost two weeks ago. Barnes and Noble should be soon. So thanks Joe and I hope that you keep making more and more money and keep writing great books.

First timer here. Anyway, I have to say as a young (age 22) writer/aspiring novelist, watever. Anyway, I'm definitely going the self-pub route. Why wouldn't I? I've spent the last few days reading your blog posts for the last few months.

I have to say all of your info, advice, guests post, etc..are invaluable. I don't think I could be anymore inspired.

And I don't know you personally, but it seems, from reading and such, to me like you deserve all the success you are currently having. I'm mightily jealous. I wish I could quit my office job and just write all day, every day! Keep up the great writing.-Kevin L. Dillon

Almost made this one, but it ain't gonna happen. I consider myself lucky that I had the chance to "corner" you several times and pick your brain. Are you sure you won't attend any more cons, even if you don't do the panels? Convention bars just won't be the same.

I wrote you the other day, but feel free to delete it (if you haven't already). I wasn't aware you weren't talking to anyone anymore, so sorry for bothering you. I just wanted to talk publishing with someone who has done well since I publish my own books, too.

First of all, you're still helping a crapload of people just by writing this blog. Please don't give up on that---to be honest, I never would've discovered your writing if it hadn't been for this blog.

A little (little) part of me wonders if you are completely cutting yourself off from the ALL things that have contributed to you selling all these books now---at least a minor public presence can't have been a bad thing overall.

By the same token, I'll be interested to see how well you do by stopping doing all the extraneous stuff altogether.

But you seem to be pretty confident about what your intentions are, and you have a lot of experience under your belt.

I hope that you have a great turnout in spite of the historic snow storm. I am from Chicago and according to my family the city has came to a complete standstill. I found your site and will stay connected. Good Luck Jurline

Wish I was in Chicago! Wait...I've seen the news...too much snow. I'll stay in NJ where we only have two feet of snow. . . Have fun Joe! Sorry we never met in person. You've been a great inspiration. Maybe some day I'll come across you in some bar and buy you a beer.

Assuming my flight can land at O'Hare, I'll be there. I enjoy LIM. I know how you feel about the whole promotion thing. When I started being published, I decided to do only promotion that I felt like doing because, like you, I have no idea if anything really 'works' or not. It's made my publishing journey a nice mix of fun and profit.

I'll be leaping into self-publishing later this year with some books whose rights were returned to me. Hope I succeed even a tiny bit as well as you! I'm switching genres with those books, so it'll be an interesting experiment, that's for sure.

Oh, and glad to hear you're bringing the booze. I was going to suggest you pick up the bar tab, but a few expensive bottles is okay, too.

Joe, does this mean it was all a ruse? You don't really love us? Bummer that you had to suffer so much, my friend! Well anyway, thanks for the posts - you've been a huge part of my education, in spite of the price you paid.

I'm sure that with success come too many people wanting a piece of you, making it necessary to sever a plethora of ties. I hope, however, that some small part of you still believes in giving back to the writing community.

I've been toying with the idea of making my email address private like a lot of bestsellers do, but instead I stated clearly on my webpage that I can't answer all email.

I'll still blog because I enjoy it. I'm lucky enough to focus on things that I enjoy, like writing. How nice it is to actually be a writer, not a speaker/salesman/promoter.

For those readers who have followed this blog from the beginning, you know I've done my best to learn about the publishing industry, and tried hard to succeed. Success didn't come until I stepped outside the industry.

All the things I thought I had to do, like traveling, book signing, speaking, teaching, promoting--didn't lead to success. So it doesn't make sense to do those things anymore, especially considering how difficult they are.

Hey Joe - thanks for the service of writing this blog. You've traveled a long road to reach this level of financial success and it appears you are taking some time to enjoy it.

I do hope that you continue to share your experiences and maintain your blog as a forum for those who are not as far along the path as you. That alone is a huge service to us.

So, thank you for your inspiration and unselfishness in sharing your experiences and reminding us that success is more about making the pie bigger for all and not just carving-out a bigger slice for ourselves.

I understand, Joe. Just reading the hundreds of comments to your posts takes me away from the writing for too long. But I do enjoy most of those comments. And I particularly enjoy your posts.

And it's great to get fan mail. But once you start getting more than two to three per day, particularly if they are asking for advice, it begins to overwhelm.

Then there's Facebook, maintaining your website, getting book covers made, having books edited, etc., and most importantly, family time and me time.

If you never do another thing to help indie writers, Joe, you've already done more than we could have possibly hoped for. As you say, everything an indie needs to know is already on this blog. Great job! Many of us would be nowhere right now without your generous efforts.

Writing demands nearly all of me. I don't have Facebook, twitter, blog, and I don't offer up my email address to fans. My contribution to them is my writing, and that takes so much out of me that I don't have more to give. I sell plenty, so I figure my writing does the talking, and my writing is what ultimately sells -- promotion is fine but a good book is what sells.

I totally get the JD Sallinger lifestyle. It works. Focus your energy on good writing, and the rest will follow.

A quick note to say that I watched Kevin Smith's little speech from this year's Sundance and it reminded me a lot of your views on the publishing industry. If you haven't checked it out yet, I think you'll enjoy it.

Also, a thanks to say that many of your blog posts have played a aprt in my decision to self pub a novel in the coming weeks...this coming from someone with a moderate small press background. Thanks.

I'm glad to see you post that you weren't angry. Sometimes things sound differently online than intended even with writers.

If you don't enjoy going to conventions, talking to fans or even blogging then it is great that you're at a point when you don't have to do them any more. You deserve and have earned every bit of success you've gotten. I haven't posted here very often, but I have followed your blog for a long time and it has been more help to me and a lot of other people than you can possibly know.

I empathize with you Joe. My day job is an IT guy, people demanding attention all day long on everything from passwords to what laptop to buy their kids. Nights & weekends are spent teaching boy scouts & church kids. In the midst of it all I write novels & record audiobooks. Sometimes we just need to chill away from it all.

That being said, if there was one last question you would answer I'd like it to be a break down of your favourite beers...cuz $1800 a bottle has me curious. I thought Hennepin & Chimay were high end.

Hey, I appreciate that you've shared this much with us. I'm going to be a graphic novel creator (once my military time is done) and you've confirmed so many of the things I felt I was learning about the publishing industry as a careful observer before I jumped in. Thanks. What you've shared is profound - your process of sweeping away the myths we're being sold as creative people who want to make a living doing creative things and the fear/joy/ understandings/questionings/realizations of your transition of perspective helps those of us still on the path to have the confidence to trust the reality we see with our own eyes despite the obfuscation and harpy songs designed to cause us to recast our own truths into mirages that keep us in a maze. Sorry to be so flowery. I want to be succinct but also communicate to you that some of your readers really "get" what you've been saying. I dare say most of us wouldn't have been as freely generous to strangers as you've been with your insights, so thanks again. May you have continued success and frequent inspiration.